


Tarnished Silver

by Kita_the_Spaz



Category: Welcome to Hell - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Ghosts, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-31
Updated: 2016-05-31
Packaged: 2018-07-11 10:37:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7044976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kita_the_Spaz/pseuds/Kita_the_Spaz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was a cold, wet day in October when Jonathan noticed the dog. </p>
<p>This short was originally written for inclusion in Erica's 2015 birthday 'zine.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tarnished Silver

It was a cold, wet day in October when Jonathan noticed the dog. He was walking home from the bus stop, for once unaccompanied by his demonic stalker. Sock had bailed halfway through US History, claiming a meeting in hell, but most likely to escape Mr. Salva’s boring monotone drone.

He was taking a shortcut by the old diner when the sound of a pained yip cut cleanly through the percussive bass of Valhalla Soundbox’s latest album. Jonathan tugged his headphones off and peered into down the alley in time to see the rear door of the diner slam shut.

A whimper drew his attention. Huddled under the dumpster was a soggy heap of gray fur. Uncaring of the damp soaking through the knee of his jeans, Jonathan knelt and clicked his tongue softly. Mismatched eyes peered suspiciously at him, one gold-brown and the other a washed out shade of blue so pale it almost looked silver.

The scrawny dog eyed him warily in between licks at a gash on one bony shoulder, sluggishly leaking bright red blood.

Digging in his backpack, Jonathan pulled out the remains of his lunch. Sock had been particularly gross during lunch break, and as a result more than half his sandwich had gone uneaten. Jonathan tore off a small piece and tossed it toward the dog. From the way it flinched, food was the last thing it expected to have thrown at it.

A muddy nose quested cautiously after the bite. Jonathan tossed another, this one falling a little farther away from the dog’s hiding place. The dog cringed but soon was creeping up to the first piece. While it debated whether or not to take it, Jonathan dropped a third bit, this one farther from the others and consequently closer to Jonathan himself. Warily, the mutt inched nearer, tail tucked between its legs. Jonathan dropped bits right up to himself, and kept a larger piece in his hand.

Carefully, letting the dog decide on its own, Jonathan offered the piece on the palm of his hand. It took a good couple of minutes, but the dog accepted the bite. Jonathan curled his fingers slowly, scratching the muddy chin while the mutt gulped down the food. The dog sagged into the caress, its tail beginning to wag in time with his scratches. From the way it whined and pushed into his hand for more, Jonathan figured it had once been a beloved pet. No feral would accept a human’s touch so willingly. “Poor thing,” Jonathan whispered, rubbing behind pointed ears. He gave it everything that had been left of his lunch, watching it disappear into that skinny frame as fast as he could offer it.

Not for the first time, Jonathan wished he could take another stray home, but after taking in every animal he found from the ages of four to eight, his parents had drawn the line. That hadn’t stopped him from feeding every stray he encountered with whatever he had on him to anything he could sneak out of the house. As a rule he’d always liked animals better than people. People were mean, often cruel— where animals offered nothing but affection.

“Let’s get you outta here, huh, boy?” Jonathan dug his fingers in the scruffy gray and white ruff, giving the dog a good scratch. He really hated to have to take it to an animal shelter, but at least there was a good no-kill one nearby. Maybe he could get his mom to drive him over there after she got off work tonight. That would give him time to clean the poor dog up and get at least one good meal inside him.

His fingers tangled in something buried in the dog’s shaggy ruff and Jonathan carefully parted the tangled fur for a closer look. It was a frayed, blue nylon collar, one that the dog had obviously been wearing for a long time. It wasn’t tight enough to have caused him any harm, but the thing was barely holding together. Jonathan felt along it for a tag, but found only a broken loop near the buckle. Gently he undid the collar, untangling it from the dog’s knotted fur.

The dog licked his hand as if grateful for Jonathan’s kindness.

Jonathan rose to his feet, tucking the mangled collar into a pocket and slapping his thigh with the other hand. “C’mon, boy. Lets get some more food in you and a nice bath.”

The dog trotted after him willingly, tongue lolling out of the side of his mouth.

Jonathan had almost made it to the end of the alley when he heard a sound that made his throat tighten with instinctive fear. He glanced back at the gray dog, now standing with all four spindly legs braced, muddy fur bristling, but tail tucked firmly between his legs, The rising and falling tones of the dog’s whining growl conveyed a mixture of terror and aggression. Those mismatched eyes seemed to be fixed on Jonathan’s right shoulder.

With a terrified yelp, the dog whirled and fled back into the depths of the alley, running as if there were a demon on his tail.

A demon? Jonathan turned his head to focus on where the dog had been staring. Sure enough, seconds later, Sock appeared from thin air, hands pulling nervously at the earflaps of his ridiculous hat. “Oh, Jonathan, I just remembered; I did something _horrible!_ I need your help! We have to go find Silver! I forgot all about him the night I…”

_Committed suicide,_ hung unsaid in the air.

“What? What are you going on about and who’s Silver?” Jonathan asked. He glanced over his shoulder into the alley, growing darker in the fading twilight.

Sock wrung his hands. “I went to this meeting and after the meeting, well, there’s this stray cerberus that hangs around Mephistopheles’ office and I got all caught up in petting it and playing with it and then I remembered my dog from before… His name was Silver and he was my bestest friend. He was really excitable and jumpy, but he was such a good dog.” He looked frantic, trying to grab onto the collar of Jonathan’s hoodie. “And I _forgot_ him!”

“Dude, calm down a second, okay?” Jonathan stepped back out of the range of Sock’s flailing hands. “You killed yourself at least a couple of months ago; and you only now remembered your pet? By now, he’s— I dunno— been adopted or something. He’s not likely to be where you left him.”

Sock’s eyes were watery. “I have to find him. I have to _know._ I can’t believe that I forgot him.”

Jonathan pursed his lips. He had a soft spot for animals, and Sock’s distraught fear was all too real. “Fine,” he sighed. “Tell me about— Silver, was it?”

Sock brightened, using his hands to measure a distance from the ground. “He’s about this tall, and he’s gray and white. He looks kinda like he’s a husky, but really short and way too skinny. Mom always said it was ‘cause he was a mutt. Oh, and he had two different colored eyes! One was brown and the other was really pale blue. He’s really excitable and…”

Sock continued babbling, but Jonathan had tuned him out, caught by the description. There couldn’t be two dogs like that… It couldn’t be that easy, could it?

Ignoring Sock’s startled yell, Jonathan whirled on his heel, back into the alley.

_Nothing._ The alley was bare, a dead end between the diner and the office building adjacent, both of them butted up against the cement wall of a two-story warehouse. The alley contained only the dumpster and the rear door of the diner. There was a fire escape high on the wall of the office building, but other than that, the alley was empty. The dog hadn’t gotten past him; there was no way he wouldn’t have seen it.

Other than the dumpster, there was no place a dog could have hidden. He wasn’t under it and he was too short to have gotten inside it. Jonathan looked anyway. No dog— and no place large enough for it to hide.

_It couldn’t have been…_

Jonathan stuck a hand in his pocket, where he had absentmindedly stowed the collar. It was as empty as the alley, even when he turned the lining inside out. There was the crumpled sack from the lunch he’d fed the dog, but the alley remained impossibly barren.

Sock drifted up behind him, an expression somewhere between concern and annoyance puckering his face. “Jonathan, what’s wrong with you? I need you to help me find Silver!”

Jonathan clenched his empty hand inside his hoodie pocket. Turning to Sock, he fixed a calm expression on his face. “Nothing, Sock. Lets go look for your dog. I’m sure he’s just…” He spared one last glance down an echoingly empty alley. “Fine.”

_“Just fine…”_ he whispered under his breath.


End file.
